I have been hunting down a rattle in the DS front for a while now. the only thing I can find loose is teh coil spring retainer. it will not tighten up for me no matter how much i wrench on it.

I now know why I dont have the rattle on the PS is due to the retainer is missing. has anyone had a coil spring come out on the trail?! that could be bad...but not sure If I can find a clip...and obvioously they are not getting tight.

 

Apparently they can strip. But what I suspect might be happening is that the original bolt isn't long enough to reach into the threads to bite due to the larger diameter of a replacement/lift spring forcing the clip to ride higher.
This is what I have currently encountered but haven't paid much mind to it just yet.
I will test this theory without the clip to see if it is biting, and then just get a longer bolt to replace the Original.

Rusty's makes a replacement spring clip for cheap though $10., I should've bought a set when I'd bought my front springs from them.

http://rustysoffroad.com/mm5/merchan...ory_Code=COILS

 

I stripped out the pass side when I put in beefier coils.
Solution for me was to use the next larger size self tapper. Snugged right up.
I think the original is a 1/2" socket size bolt. I put in a 9/16" in it's place.

 

Im having the same problem, the bolt is loose and won't grip i will try a bigger bolt but the question is
what's the worst that could happen?

 

Im having the same problem, the bolt is loose and won't grip i will try a bigger bolt but the question is
what's the worst that could happen?

 

The stock bolt is an 8mm x 1.25 self taping. Mine stripped as well, so I drilled the hole out and tapped it. I then dropped a 10mm regular grade 8 bolt in with some blue locktite and cranked it down. It's solid now.

But the stock retainer bracket is still a piece of crap. I suggest you get some heavyduty replacement retainers and install them. They cost around ten bucks and can be purchased online from various sources. Iron Rock Offroad has some, so does Zone.

 

I've never seen one pop out, but they wouldn't put it there for no reason and would hate to have a spring pop out because of a 50 cent bolt.

 

i looked into some of them. primarily Rustys. but when they wanted over $20 to ship them I said F it. I havent reinstalled them yet. lol

 

how would I go about retapping that part? what tools would I need?

 

The spring retainers are there only because jeep used them to hold the springs in place on the assembly line. They aren't necessary, some Jeeps don't even have them.